A season that has felt like it could go on forever now has a match that almost did.
However much Chelsea feared their Club World Cup campaign could turn into a long slog, nothing could have prepared them for this: a game that finished four hours and 38 minutes after it began.
Saturday’s — yes, just checking it is still Saturday — 4-1 win over Benfica set up a quarterfinal against Palmeiras next Friday after Christopher Nkunku, Pedro Neto and Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall all struck in extra time to settle one of the most truncated matches in history.
The Blues will be extremely grateful they have six days to recover from this. In what felt like a different age, Reece James’ 64th-minute free kick appeared to have given Chelsea a hard-fought if largely uninspiring victory but, in reality, the game had barely started.
Slovenian referee Slavko Vincic stopped the match with four minutes remaining for a severe weather warning that forced the players from the field and the fans to the safety of the concourse at the Bank of America Stadium. As a storm rattled around this part of North Carolina, a proposed time to resume was pushed back on several occasions. Chelsea’s players huddled inside the locker room, many on bikes trying to tick over. A rainbow eventually appeared. With the threat of another storm system coming in, both teams agreed to a shortened warm-up to try to squeeze in the final period before the lightning returned. In fact, there was plenty more to come. Nicolás Otamendi headed at goal, and as Malo Gusto jumped, the ball hit the back of his hand. He was facing the other way; the idea he had any intent to handle the ball was absurd, but that does not matter in this day and age: It was deemed to be in an unnatural position and Benfica had their lifeline.
When Ángel Di María stroked home the spot kick to equalize in the fifth minute of added time, it was almost 8 p.m. local time and many in the 25,929 crowd had disappeared into the city.
They missed a rousing encore. Gianluca Prestianni was shown a second yellow card two minutes into extra time, and Chelsea made their numerical advantage count. Cole Palmer found Moisés Caicedo in the box. His shot was saved by Benfica goalkeeper Anatoliy Trubin, but the ball squirmed free, and as Otamendi tried to clear, Nkunku reacted quickest to wrap his body around the ball and fire high into the net. Benfica’s race was finally run and they conceded twice on the counterattack with Neto racing clear for his third goal in four games before Dewsbury-Hall followed suit with a clever dinked finish.
Blues coach Enzo Maresca celebrated with a cluster of supporters near the dugout afterward, but he could not hide his outrage at being asked to complete a game in these conditions — the sixth such occasion at the Club World Cup where a match has been stopped due to bad weather.
“For 85 minutes we were in control of the game,” Maresca said. “We didn’t concede nothing, we created chances enough to win the game. And then after the break, the game changed completely. I think for me personally it’s not football.–ESPN
